"Didn't my father waste away like this?" he suddenly said to Mr. Pym, one day.
"Oh, pooh, no!" quite angrily replied the surgeon. "Your father had a peck of troubles upon him--and I'm sure you can't remember anything about him, for you were only five years old when he died."
George St. John laughed. "You need not fear frightening me, Pym. I think he did waste away; but that's no reason, you know, why I should do so."
He said nothing to his wife of this feeling of indisposition, or that he was consulting Mr. Pym. This was from no particular wish of suppressing it; more, that he really did not think it sufficiently important to speak about. But it came to her knowledge incidentally.
She grew strong again, and was sitting on the slopes one afternoon with her embroidery, quiet, gentle, smiling, as if not a cloud of anger had ever distorted her fair features, when she saw Mr. Pym approach and enter the house. It suddenly occurred to her that she had so seen him once or twice lately, and had wondered, in a passing way, what he wanted. Certainly his visits were not to her now.
"What can it be that he comes for?" she said aloud, pausing in her work, and gazing at the door through which Mr. Pym had disappeared.
If the question was not addressed to air, it must have been meant for Benja, that young gentleman being the only person within sight and hearing. He was sitting astride on the arm of the bench at Mrs. St. John's elbow, absorbed in a new picture-book that Honour had bought him, and teasing Mrs. St. John's patience out with his demands that she should admire its marvels.
"Mr. Pym comes for papa," said quick Benja.
"For papa!" she repeated. "Nonsense, Benja! Papa's not ill. He's looking very thin, but I am sure he's not ill."
"Mr. Pym comes for him, and he sends him physic," persisted Benja. "For I was in the room yesterday, mamma, and heard them talking."